Slaton man gets life prison sentence in child sex abuse case

Thursday

Apr 12, 2018 at 6:33 PMApr 12, 2018 at 7:34 PM

A Lubbock jury handed a life sentence to a Slaton man accused of sexually abusing children, including family members, for more than 20 years.

Jurors deliberated for 20 minutes before returning to the courtroom in the 364th District Court Thursday evening with their punishment, sentencing Douglas Stapp to life in prison. They also handed him two, 20-year prison sentences for separate instances of sexual abuse he inflicted on a 6-year-old girl about four years ago.

Stapp’s sentence will run concurrently and he will be eligible for parole in 30 years.

“I can't relate. I don’t know what to say, but the things that you did to those little girls … those are horrible things and you really did ruin some lives and you need to think about that,” Judge William Eichman told Stapp, 52, as he sentenced him. “Those are really monstrous things.”

Earlier in the day, jurors deliberated for about four and 1/2 hours before returning to the courtroom with their verdicts finding him guilty of lesser included offenses of aggravated sexual assault of a child and two separate charges of indecency with a child by sexual contact. The first charge carries a punishment of five years to life in prison and the remaining charges carry a punishment of two to 20 years in prison.

In their closing arguments in the guilt-innocence phase of the trial, prosecutors told jurors Stapp they believed the evidence presented to them in the last two days showed that he was guilty of the greater offense of continuous sexual abuse of a child, which carries a punishment of 25 years to life in prison without parole.

Evidence in the trial included testimony from the girl, who is now 9, in which she recalled multiple episodes of abuse at Stapp’s hand, including exposing himself to her when she was 6 years old. Prosecutors believed there was enough evidence that showed Stapp abused the girl for more than 30 days from 2013 to 2014 to find him guilty of the greater offense.

Testimony in the trial indicated Stapp lived with the girl and her mother for about 10 months and was alone with the girl on a nearly daily basis while her mother was at work.

Though Stapp only faced charges for sexually abusing one girl, relatives of Stapp testified against him, saying he also sexually abused them at every opportunity. The relatives, who are in their 20s now, said Stapp abused them when they were between 8 to 9 years old. All of the victims in the case recalled to jurors how Stapp threatened to harm them or their parents if they reported what happened. The relatives came forward with their allegations against Stapp after he was arrested in 2014.

However, the primary victim's statements about the times Stapp abused her were unclear.

Defense attorney Charles Chambers told jurors he believed the girl’s testimony doesn’t confirm, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the abuse happened for more than 30 days, which is the statutory time frame for the greater offense.

“There is testimony as to general time frames,” he said. “(However there is) reasonable doubt that these instances occurred in a period in excess of 30 days.”

Chambers asked jurors to assess a 20-year punishment for each charge.

“I believe that will be adequate to protect society,” he said.

Slack argued Stapp deserved the maximum sentence of life in prison for the 20 years of sexual abuse he has inflicted on his relatives, who now suffer emotional trauma as adults.

“Ask yourself how comfortable are you of him ever having access to another kid,” he said.

Chambers said he was surprised and grateful jurors did not find his client guilty of the greater offense, which would have eliminated the chance of early release on parole.

"I certainly respect their verdict and we'll do our usual appeals, but I just appreciate not finding for the continuous sexual abuse of a child," he said.

Slack said he was pleased with the verdict and understood the challenge jurors faced.

"The challenge of proving that charge was that you have a child who was 6 at the time and 5 at some of the time of the offenses, so we know that he had access to her for a long period of time but you're kind of working with her testimony and her previous statements in getting there," he said.

He said he believed the sentence reflects the Lubbock community's intolerance for sexual offenses against children.

"A swift, strong life sentence -- and that's consistently what we see from juries in the community, that's not surprising-- for someone that sexually abused a child of that age, his own (relatives) ... that's what we need and that's what we expect to continue from Lubbock county jurors," he said.

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